Sickle Cell Anemia disease is the most common blood cell disease which occurs in your bloodstream where red blood cells travel through. Normal red blood cells are a disk-shape and look like a donut (yum) without any hole in the center of the cell. Red blood cells contain an iron-rich protein called hemoglobin, but unlikely, sickle blood cells carry an abnormal blood cell called ‘sickle hemoglobin’ or ‘hemoglobin S.’ which causes the shape to be ‘sickle’ or ‘crescent’. Normal blood cells travel easily through your blood vessels but sickle blood cells are stiff and sticky, and tend to block your blood flow in the blood vessels of the limbs and organs. Red blood cells usually last for about 120 days until the new cells are replaced, but in sickle cell anemia, the numbers of red blood cells decrease because they only last for about 10 to 20 days and bone marrow can’t make new blood cells quick enough to replace the dead cells. (Note*, Bone marrow – flexible tissue in the interior of the bones that houses stem cells, produces red blood cells.)
Overview
Sickle Cell Anemia is one type of anemia (anemia is a condition in which your blood has a lower number of red blood cells than normal number of red blood cells.
Sickle Cell Anemia is occurred when the blood cells do not contain enough hemoglobin.
Sickle Cell Anemia is an inherited, lifelong disease. They are born with it, it is from two genes from both parents.
Sickle Cell Anemia vs. Sickle Cell trait - People who inherit a sickle hemoglobin gene from one parent and a normal gene from the other parent have a condition called Sickle Cell Trait. It is different from Sickle Cell Anemia because people who have Sickle Cell trait don't have the disease but they may pass it to their children because they still have the gene that will cause the disease.
Other Information
Sickle Cell Anemia disease has no widely available cure, however treatments such as 'blood and marrow stem cell transplants' may help with the symptom and its complication.
Some people who have the disease have the long term pain or fatigue but with proper treatment, they can improve their lifestyle and their health.
Symptoms
Some of the symptoms are episodes of pain in your chest, abdomen and joints; blockage of the blood vessel, swollen hands & feet; blocking blood flow, frenquent infection; sickle blood cells carry weak blood cells that will not able to prevent and fight the infection, delayed growth; red blood cells provide oxygen that are important for growth, but shortage of healthy red blood cell can slow growth, vision problem; the sickle blood cells may block the vessels that supply to your eyes.
Glycocalyx...I honestly don't have the exact answer that could brightly explain what Glycocalyx is, because I honestly don't understand the concept of having another layer of cell outside the cell wall, and I don't think Glycocalyx does not have only one function that it contributes to the cell, which makes it more complex...But I have the basic knowledge through reading some articles and some replies on Wikianswers... I don't think the term "Glycocalyx" is fairly a good known term for people around the world because I found that there aren't many good articles on the web and there were no videos on Youtube...Anyway, based on my prior knowledge, Glycocalyx is built up of another layer of glyco protein cell that lies just the outside the cell wall of some bacterium and as well as multicellular organisms(I wasn't sure about multicellular because some people suggested it only exists in prokaryoke cell). Glycocalyx provides recognition markers for immune system, helps bacteria from getting dehydrated, allows to trap nutrients that bacteria needs from the outer environment, and also provides protection for cell. But that's not the only function that is involved. The Glycocalyx enables certain bacteria to resist phagocytic (phagocyte: it's like a type of white blood cell that engulfs...bad bacteria) engulfment by white blood cells in the body or protozoans in soil and water. The glycocalyx also enables some bacteria to adhere to environmental surfaces (rocks, root hairs, teeth, etc.), colonize, and resist flushing. There are 2 types of Glycocalyx and the structural features and composition of glycocalyces differ depending on the species of bacteria. One type of Glycocalyx is called Slime Layer, which is a composition of gluco proteins that are loosely associated with cell wall (it means that it's not directly attached to the cell wall). The bacteria that has Slime layer can avoid from being dehydrated and lack of nutrients. The other type is called the Capsule, which is a composition of sugar molecule that is more firmly attached to the cell wall. Capsule provides protection for bacteria, nutrients and as well as the adherence to new solid surfaces. Capsule also makes bacteria stronger that phagocytic white blood cell cannot get rid of them, that's why some of the bacterial diseases are critical...
"Glycocalyx." World of Microbiology and Immunology. Ed. K. Lee Lerner and Brenda Wilmoth Lerner. Gale Cengage, 2003. eNotes.com. 2006. 12 Oct, 2011 <http://www.enotes.com/microbiology-encyclopedia/
glycocalyx>
Everything started out in Hong Kong where Beth Emhoff visited there for her business meeting. She was transmitted to an unknown disease due to several touches, coughs from different people. The origin of the virus was not specified but Beth was not feeling at the best on the way back to Minneapolis. After 2 days when Beth arrived at home, she was killed due to the spread of virus inside of her body and her husband Mitch was shocked that it happened all of the sudden and the doctor had no idea what caused her death. Her son was dead as well and Mitch thought that the virus from her wife was transmitted to his son. Soon, the virus was spreading through the air and the others started facing mysterious symptom that caused death. In Minneapolis, Chicago, Paris, London, and Hong Kong, the numbers of death dramatically increased from the infectious virus and the numbers multiplied itself every time someone was transmitted to a disease. Deputy Cheaver? and a young doctor Kate was trying to analysis what type of virus it is and looked for sources that would help to find out the origin of the virus.
Virus - A virus is an infectious disease that can travel throughout the air from a person to a person. Some people are born to be immunized from the virus (like the main character from the movie, Mitch Emhoff). It seems like the number of virus tends to increase no matter the strength of virus, because the person who is infected can transmit the virus who does not have it and the person who was infected can spread the disease to many others.
Quarantine - It's like being isolated so people who do not have the disease cannot be transmitted from a person who is carrying the virus.
Vaccine - A way to prevent from catching the virus (like a medicine that works to fight against the disease). I believe that in vaccine, doctors put tiny amount of virus that people are dealing to fight against, they inject the small amount of virus into the body, which we are able to fight back and win..because they injected small amount. That's how people get immunized from getting vaccines.
Immunity - Being able to fight back viruses. People can be immunized from getting vaccines or some people are born in the way that they can't be infected.
How did I feel after watching this movie?
This film felt so realistic that I couldn't even touch anything or share a drink with Zach in the theatre. I was pretty scared of catching disease from other people and yet, I was pretty mad at people as well, because it really isn't their fault that he got a disease, but they could have stayed at home and not spreading the disease to other people. It's going to be mandatory for me to wash my hands 20 times a day, in school, at home, everywhere. The main character Mitch Emhoff seemed to be pretty calm even though his wife was dead in front of her (maybe it's because she was his new wife) and his son died as well. He took care of his daughter very much since she was the only surviving among the family of his. Beth, her son, and other people had like a bubble at the stage when they were about to death and the bubble became solid looking mixture and I believe that those substances clocked their throat and caused them to death (I'm not sure though). The images was like a disaster, it's wasn't like bombs that were dropped all around the world but people were rapidly moving to the area where it is move safe. I realised that there are many, many, many people around the world and it was incredible to see how millions of people transmitted the viruses after few days. The background music was depressing and slow when Mitch and his daughter was isolated from other people so they can't be infected. I see myself being isolated so I can't get diseases or I'm the only one who has survived in the world (like the movie "I am the Legend", that would be really lonely and I'd rather kill myself.
Realistic features from the Movie
Lipkin says societies need to be more proactive in combating the dangers. "People need to understand that science is critical to address these kinds of challenges and respond in real time," he said. "We need to be prepared. We need better bio-surveillance, with better detection and better ability to develop vaccines. However, our public health system is underfunded and overwhelmed, and we need more scientists." (Ellis, R. (2011, Oct 22). Contagion film is not far from the truth, warns virus scientist [Web log message]. Retrieved from http://www.guardian.co.uk/science/2011/oct/22/contagion-film-truth-viral-pandemic?newsfeed=true) I honestly believe that the virus that can kill all the people around the world, is going to happen. The virus tends to spread out through out the air, from people to people. The number of infections would obviously increase if that keep happening, which will lead into massive death. Out of all the people (a lot of people) that I've seen from the movie was not immunized with their genetic and Matt Emhoff (maybe his daughter as well) was the only one who cannot catch the virus because of his genetic. What element from the movie seemed so realistic that, like I said, the percentage of having immune system without injecting vaccine is very low. What if we don't have vaccines for virus, what is going to happen after? Some people cannot be transmitted because the way how they're born, but what about all the people? We need more scientists to create more immune systems so people can fight the disease. This film showed that virus can happen anytime at anywhere, just a touch, or cough can spread the disease and caused them to death.
Homework Post #4 - My belief on Stem Cell Research
I'm going to write a view of mine based on the research of Stem Cell. Some people would think what I'm suggesting is definitely wrong and some people would think that my opinion is legitimate as well. Before I go on further, I just want to say if the research could help people and save lives, then I strongly suggest that Stem Cell research should go on further.
Based on Protestant view of Stem Cell research, we supported Stem Cell in some way but there were many restriction regarding "killing potential human" etc. I've also taken advices from other religions, scientists and volunteer based on Stem Cell research. The presentation that interested me the most was the group from Jewish religion. Instead of thinking complexity, they thought of Stem Cell as just simply helping human out. Protestant's belief is a lot similar to Jewish religion but we have more stricter rules and punishment.
The first sentence from rubric suggests that many unused embryos produced through IVF will be discarded and it is asking if it's okay to use them instead of throwing them as waste. I strongly agree that embryonic stem cell should be used instead of putting into waste. If it is discarded, I believe that it is considered same as killing potential lives because when they're thrown out, they will not be treated as human potential, they will be treated as waste. So instead of throwing them out, I'd say we should do some more research to save people's lives. I would like to add one requirement in order to use discarded embryonic stem cell. The cell has to be fertilized no more than 14 days because once the cell development has reached the multipotent stage, 3 germ layers will have specific jobs and they all have human parts. Therefore I'm going to consider as a murder when research has been done with Stem Cells that were fertilized more than 14 days.
If we have the technology, then we should use and build on the technology. As part of a protestant, I believe that what God created is faulty. Therefore human and God should cooperate with each other in order to solve problem and help each other out. Technology can save peoples lives and make their life much more easier. So as long as we have a technology, we all should build it further so we can build a better humanity.
I believe that Government money should be used for Stem Cell research. As long as the scientists are finding out what the stem cell is and how it can be used, the government should provide money so we can discover more things about stem cell. We already know that there are so many good possibilities that can come from stem cell and its potential is very huge. Therefore, I believe that as part of a country, government should provide money for further research.
I don't necessary believe that the stem cell research should be regulated within government. Because the main factor of stem cell research is to help peoples lives. What concerns me is that if the stem cell research is regulated by the government, they're going to create rules that are not obvious but limits on different things. Government will take all the money from people when someone broke the rule and I think that wouldn't be fair. If the whole system is controlled by the government, we wouldn't be able to say our opinions because what government saying is always right. As being part of a citizen, I believe that there should some obvious restrictions but the government should not make limits on different things regarding stem cells.
I believe that embryonic stem cells are different than adult stem cell. Because like I said from above, I believe when the cell has reached within 14 days of fertilization and turned into multi potent stage, the cell has gained the full significance of human. Embryonic stem cell is still a living thing, but it does not have a significance of human individual. I think of stem cell research as in terms of radical contraption but not killing a human individual.
I think therapeutic cloning should be prohibited. I know that there are many things that we can possibly get from developing therapeutic cloning but I believe therapeutic cloning takes away the significance of human birth. God created the way we're supposed to be and I don't think it is right to put mechanically formed organs into our body when needed.
Reference - Justin
Homework Post # 5 - The Hot Zone Part 1
The novel is a work of a fiction that contains 4 horrifying pathogens which are all filoviruses. Including Marburg, Ebola Sudan, Ebola Reston and Ebola Zaire.
Charles Monet is introduced. He decides to go on a vacation and he goes on a trip in Kenya with a girl. Several days later, Monet develops a virus from Kitum Cave that is later known as Marburg, which is a filovirus. After experiencing the illness, Monet leaves Kenya right away and take a flight to the hospital. He has a constant headache, red eyes, constant nose bleed that does not clog and he is vomiting a black stuff that was full of viruses. Monet eventually dies at the surgery while Dr.Musoke tries to save him. Monet is constantly losing his blood; bleeding from skin pores, and he throws up a black vomit all over Dr.Musoke's body. Dr.Musoke is infected because he has been exposed to Marburg virus(from the vomit). Fortunately, his illness was gone after 10 days. David Silverstein wants to find out what is the reason for him being dead. So he takes a sample from Dr.Musoke and finds out that Charles Monet died because of Marburg Virus.
Nancy Jaxx is introduced after 4 years later. She works in a military institution and she works in the Bio Level 4 room dealing with a virus called Ebola; a strain of Marburg, so it is another filovirus. She experiences a very close encounter dealing with Ebola Virus. She recently makes herself a deep cut on her palm and she witnesses a blood dripping through her space suit gloves while she is in the Bio Level 4 Room. Luckily, she is saved because she is wearing a second layer of rubber gloves which protects Ebola Virus from going into her opened cut. Later on, they find out the different strains of Ebola: Ebola Zaire and Ebola Sudan.
The part where it shook me was definitely how Charles Monet died. I couldn't go on reading because it was so graphic imagining stuffs in my head. It didn't really capture my interest, it was really horrifying that it took my interest. Like he was throwing stuffs that were full of black stuffs, blood, viruses and he started bleeding from his intestine, eek! The other one that captured my interest was the bravery of Nancy Jaxx. She was not allowed in the Bio 3 Level Room because the requirement was vaccinations (she had all of them but she felt very sick after getting the vaccines) so she was not allowed. Then, she moves on to the Bio 4 Level Room, which does not require any vaccination (because there aren't any!) and it was more dangerous. She had a big cut on her palm and it surprised me that she was not infected by the virus. What she did was more like being very passionate about what she loves to do, or she's really stupid for going in there, risking her life. (My opinion)
Homework Post # 6 - The Hot Zone Part 2
The second part of the Hot Zone is about the monkeys that are imported from Philippine. The monkeys are kept in Reston, Virginia and they were to be sold across the country. One of the worker in a monkey,house Dan Dalgard starts noticing that the monkeys are getting sick. He becomes a little bit suspicious since all the monkeys were to be checked to be healthy before entering the country. Later soon, illness starts to spread out throughout the monkeys and then to the other rooms in the monkey houses. The monkeys are infected and start to die. Dan Dalgard contacts USAMRIID after many more monkeys died. He is informed that the monkeys were killed because of Simian Fever (a disease that is very lethal for the monkeys but harmless to humans), but they are not 100% certain. An intern at USAMRIID believes that he has observed a filovirus, specifically a Marburg. The heads of the department want to confirm what really caused the death of the monkeys and Nancy Jaxx is assigned to dissect the dead monkey and find out what the virus is. After the dissection, Nancy finds a virus but she can't tell if it is Ebola Zaire or Marburg or perhaps a mutation of both viruses. People begin to panic because filoviruses such as these were never seen outside of Africa, yet it is seen just outside the border of Washington D.C. There are already 2 people who are sick and suspected to have Ebola inside of them. The C.D.C is called up and they're responsible to protect the citizens and USAMRIID is to look after the monkey houses. Jerry Jaax, Nancy's husband, is assigned head of the monkey house mission.
What surprised me from this part is that Jerry Jaxx is randomly introduced. I have a feeling that the author purposely put him in the book because something bad will happen. The other thing that surprised me is that there are already 2 cases of illness that is possibly shipped from the monkeys to humans. I believe in the middle of the book, Jerry's brother was killed yet there is no purpose either. I think the author put this part in the book because something significant will happen later on. This part of the book makes me think that what if I was in Washington D.C with an outbreak of a filovirus. I think I know how that would feel like because my house was on fire once and we were all panicking. That's what I think I'm going to be like if I was living in an infected area.
Homework Post # 6 - The Hot Zone Part 3
In part 3 of the Hot Zone, it brings back to the monkey house where the virus was found. They are in Reston and discussing what would be the best way to eliminate the virus that have infected the monkey. Jerry Jaxx sets up a team of members who are qualified to contact Ebola Virus that has been causing harms to the monkeys in the monkey houses. The members were informed that there will be dangers involved but they did not want the public to be informed. It ended up that, the only way to eliminate the virus was to kill all the monkeys that were in the monkey houses. The team had given T-61 shots to the monkeys to put them down and the bodies of the monkeys were bagged and dragged away. However, they soon found out that Ebola could only infect the monkeys but not humans. After all the incidents, the team gassed the whole area for disinfection. They used a special crystal and a sunbeam to change it into formaldehyde gas. The ending of the Part 3 basically says that not a single virus could survive with that much to the virus and the people are now completely safe.
It was terrifying the fact that all the stories that was told from this book was based on a true story. It was scary to see how the strain of Ebola Virus was quickly turned into Ebola Reston and killed all the monkeys that were in the monkey house. Virus is like a thing that you cannot predict when it is going to come and that's what scares me the most. I've became more insecure for myself after reading this book because there are viruses everywhere that can harm me. I work at a restaurant and I sometimes use the customer's washroom. I just don't feel like touching the doorknob to open the door and touch anything because so many people have touched the area. It may sound corny but I feel like I have become a lot insecure to the society and I honestly don't like being super clean but I feel like it is necessary. It surprising to see that the virus only killed the monkeys but not humans. I had a feeling that from this chapter, many people would have been died because of the virus. It is scary to think that just one mutation can start a worldwide pandemic within the human race and harm us.
Homework Post # 7 - The Hot Zone Part 4
In part 4 of the Hot Zone, the author of the book Richard Preston visits the Mount Elgon with couple of his friends, Jamy Buchanan and Frederic Grant, along with a professional hunter, Robin MacDonald, and his family. Richard takes many safety precautions and equipments such as a level 4 biological space suit because Charles Monet (from the chapter 1) was infected to the virus during his trip to Kitnum Cave. As he enters the cave with his flashlight on, he notices many diversities of things that potentially have the Ebola strain such fruit bats, insect bats, moths, flies, spiders, even rocks. The novels finishes with Richard visiting the abandon monkey house and notes that there are many organisms living in the house. He concludes that Ebola will be back eventually.
I thought it was interesting to see the author of the Hot Zone visiting the Kitnum Cave where the victim was killed due to the virus. It would be adventurous for sure but I would never be able to go to a place where it is full of harmful viruses. I also wonder what would happen if a person who does not know anything about the cave and visit there without any safety equipments. It was also interesting to see Richard visiting the monkey houses that has been leash for many years. I searched up the monkey house in Reston and I found some pictures that were taken between 1995 ~ 1998, which is the year when the monkey house was torn down. http://www.pbase.com/eeegi/monkeyhouse&page=all
Personal Post #1 : How Calluses Form
Why research on calluses?
My finger have gotten a lot uglier than how it used to be. Playing guitar has definitely took away my pretty fingers, I've lost all my fingerprints on my left index, middle, ring, pinky fingers, and thumb as well. My nails are quite shorter than normal people because fretting down on the strings stretches my nails inward, so I have to cut them very short. I've lost the sense of feeling on the tip of my fingers, which was pretty horrifying to admit that I can't feel something when I touch them. Although, having calluses was worth it because it shows how much I have given my time to learn guitar, and it does not hurt no more when I press down on those vicious strings. It feels pretty satisfying to look back into the past and compare how much I have improved and how much I'm having fun with it. Learning guitar was definitely worth of giving effort and let's find out what calluses are and how they're formed.
What are they? How are they formed?
Before the calluses form, a bubble looking liquid substance is formed which we define them as a "blister." (I had blisters before having calluses, it really wasn't a good time) Blister is formed when the blood vessel close to the outer layer of the skin is damaged and the liquid substance that fills in the are where the skin is damaged. It protects the tissue underneath by cushioning the damaged area, the liquid substance is called 'serum'. Now calluses, your skin has a number of layers of different type of cells. The outermost skin consists around 25 hardened, dead cells and they consistently flake off as the outermost skin is replaced by new hardened dead cells underneath. If the skin occurs in irregular amount of friction, the number of new layer of dead cells increase. New dead cells are added faster than the old ones slough away. This can build up from 25 over 100 layer of dead skin cells. While calluses can be quite useful, if the process continues unchecked a callus can thicken into a cone-shaped structure called a corn. You may want to see a doctor it those super calluses become too much painful
Guys, really really thinkable video! Why would I bother posting a video if it doesn't interest you! Take some time to watch it and see how you feel about Bio-engineering! Link to the video...
Awesome, awesome video. Mr.Smith showed me this video for about a year ago and I've done a presentation based on this video. It is fascinating how human started creating new creatures by mixing up two genetics and make like glowing monkeys with glowing cells from deep sea creatures. It is pretty rad when you look at these images but if you think about the ethic behind this science development, it's not right. That's at least what I think. Because to me, it is like taking the autonomy from the animals just because there is something that humans want to discover or make new creatures that did not existed before. Watch the video if you want to find what I'm talking about... I am very supportive on development of science but from this video, I feel like human race need to grow up and stop going for things that are not necessary...I kind of felt sick after watching this video because it disguises me how humans can do anything that they want just because we are smarter than animals.
Watching National Geographic videos on YouTube is the most productive thing to do (when I don't have homework, and have spare time). It's interesting to see how other animals interact with each other and what different types of animals are living in the ecosystem. I've seen hundreds of videos just based on lifestyle of animals and one of the most exciting video to see was, Deep Sea Creatures and how they live under the darkness and temperature nearly frozen. Typical deep sea creatures are ugly and turns out to be bio-luminescence; they can glow in the dark. Scientists are still studying for revolution changes of how deep sea creatures are able to produce light in the dark. Deep sea creatures generally create glowing light from luminescence, which is a reaction of chemical compounds mixed and cause luminescent light. The researches of deep sea creatures started in 1600's, they had a solid of idea of how deep sea creatures make their own light (which is the process of "chemical reaction". But since there are different types of fishes with using different substances to create their own light, so it was hard to verity how bio luminescent species makes light. Bio-luminescence can be difficult to study since many fishes exhaust their luminescent abilities when captured and the process of capturing damages the organ that produce glowing light in the body.
Deep sea creatures use their light to find a mate, scare away the predator or ensnare prey, that's cool!
Deep Sea Creatures!
Fangtooth - also known as Anoplogaster cornuta is a fish that inhabits deep water of the ocean. Fangtooth usually grow about six inches in length. It has a short body but a large head, and the name Fangtooth came from its big, sharp, fang-like tooth that are quite big compared to the size of its body. The color of adults ranges from dark brown to black. Fangtooth inhabits in extreme deep under the ocean about depth of 16,000 feet, which means the temperature is nearly freezing and foods are very rare to be found. So they will just about anything they can find.
Fangtooth
#2
Dragonfish - (also known as Grammatostomias flagellibarba) is a dangerous predator in spite of its small size. Dragonfish grow about 6 inches in length. It has a large head with sharp, fang-like tooth. The Dragonfish has a long, luminescent barbel attached to its chin. The light producing barbel is also known as phosphore. The Dragonfish uses barbel like a signal device, it waves back and forth and able to see unexpected fishes. They also have phosphore along the side of its body, it is used for mating and also to attracted prey fishes. Dragonfishe lives in deep ocean water at depths of up to 5000 feet, they are found in the tropical region around the world.
Dragon Fish
Gulper Eel..
Gulper Eel - (also known as Eurypharynx pelecanoides) Gulper Eel is pretty weird looking if I have to judge to myself...It is quite distinctive with its big mouth and it can swallow animals that are much larger than itself. Gulper Eel lives at the depth of 3000 to 6000 feet deep inside the ocean water.
Giant Squid (also known as Architeuthis dux) Probably one of the largest living animal in the world and it can grow up to 60 feet long...They are carvivore
Giant Squid!
and they will eat anything that they can catch. There is a story from World War 2 that shipmates were eaten by this huge squid and the boat was sunken in the middle of the ocean. I'm not sure if that's true or not...A fairy tale. Giant Squid's favourite meal is, a Sperm Wale!
Giant Isopod - (also known as Bathynomus giganteus) A member of Isopod family. They are carvivores and they will eat just about anything that they can catch (like other deep sea creatures do) These animals are very prehistoric looking creatures...Giant Isopod can grow up to 16 inches and when they're threatened, they can roll into like a ball and protect themselves. Giant Isopods live at the depth of over 2000 feet.
(2007). 10 horrible deep sea creatures. (2007). [Print Photo]. Retrieved from http://www.oddee.com/item_79915.aspx - All the images were retrived from this website.
Personal Post #4 - Hong Kong Flu in 1968
What is Hong Kong Flu?
Hong Kong Flu...! As you can tell, the flu is originated from Hong Kong in 1968. The main cause of this flu was H3N2 (which another type of swine flu, like the one we had couple of years ago, H1N1) It took away many lives of course, approximately a million people world wide (38,000 lives in the US). Although, the Hong Kong Flu was milder than Spanish Flu or Asian Flu in 1957 and there are several reasons why the flu was milder than any of these major disease. First, Hong Kong Flu peaked in December when all the children was staying home to celebrate holidays, and the flu did not spread throughout the school because most of students were staying home. Second, Hong Kong Flu broke out after decades from Asian Flu, which led scientists to improve more antibiotics medicines to fight against the secondary bacterial that often accompanied the flu virus. And last, some people still carried immunity from Asian Flu in 1957.
Symptoms of Hong Kong Flu/H3N2
High fever
Joint pain
Muscle aches
Fatigue, malaise
Runny nose
Severe cough.
Eye irritation and redness
Headache
Diarrhea
Vomiting
How to treat H3N2
It's pretty simple and...common sense. All you have to do is to take a good rest so your immune system can fight back the influenza, drink a lot of fluid such soups, fruit juice to stay away from dehydration, substitute good amount of Vitamin C, and hot fluids helps to relieve sore throat. Some medications would help as well, such as Tylenol, Motrin, or Advil.
Warning - You will find some of the cases or images below disturbing in nature.
1) Two Faced Baby : Diprosopus
Two faced baby, Lali
Example of MRI
Lail, the two faced baby is born with 4 eyes, 2 nose, 2 lips and 1 pair of ears. Her body structure is almost the same as the normal babies, with 1 pair of arms and legs as well. It may seems a lot odd to people who have not had babies like her but her parents think that their baby was a gift from god...Pretty cool! The girl is born with Diprosopus or Craniofacial Duplication, which is and extreme rare condition disorder whereby part or all of the face is duplicated on the head, so one of the head is a head from her undeveloped twin's. The story is pretty unfortunate because her parents considered Lail that she was in a very good condition, just like the other babies. So the parents refused to evaluate daughter's health through X-ray or MRI(Magnetic Resonance Imaging)(1). Then, after 2 month from her birth in 2008, she passed away from heart attack. Since there are no evidences of evaluation from any of her body condition, nothing could be proven because she was buried right after her death. Scientists only knew that Lail had a disease called Diprosopus, a rare disease. She also suffered from Corneal Opacity from middle two eyes due to excessive facial muscle which prevents from closing the middle eyes. My assumtion is that Lail only has 1 brain because she closed and opened her 4 eyes at the same time and one of the head is an uncompleted part from her twin, the head is just proportionally stuck with her remaining head. But who knows, she may have had 2 brains that had different function, maybe 2 hearts, who knows...I'd blame everything on parents because they believed Lail was perfectly fine, but they did not know the truth...Fools!
2) One Eyed Baby : Cyclopia
The baby was born in Nigeria and she suffered from Cyclopia (also known as cyclocephaly or synophthalmia)It is a rare birth defect characterized by failure of embryonic forebrain to divide into two orbital cavities for the eyeballs resulting in one eye. She does not have a function of a nose because she doesn't have one...The cause of Cyclopia is from high toxic and doses from anticancer therapy which I assumed that mother have taken the seizure.
3) Two Headed Baby : Craniopagus parasiticus
Manar Maged was born in Banha, Egypt and she suffered from a disorder called Craniopagus Parasiticus; parasitic twin head with an undeveloped (or underdeveloped) body is attached to the head of a developed twin. Manar improved her conditions by having different seizures but there was no miracle that doctors could separate the underdeveloped twin from the developed twin. The other twin was named Islaam and believe it or not, she was alive. It seems like Islaam does not have organs, which is true.She was getting nutrition from Manar. She was breathing in and out with Manar's lungs and she was exchanging her blood with Manar's heart... Manar passed away from a brain infection caused by hydrocephalus at the age of six. There are only 10 documents of this cases worldwide and only 3 of them were documented to have survived from birth.
4) Frog like Baby : Anencephaly
As you can see from the picture above, the baby does not look quite normal...The name was not listed from the website that I was using, but it says that he was born in Charikot, Nepal and people are pretty well gathered up to witness this abnormal looking baby. The neck is missing due to excessive muscle tissues around the neck, arms are quite long compared to what other babies have, a big nose, mouth and lastly, the eyeballs looks as if it will pop out in any second. The baby suffers from a birth disorder called Anencephaly and what kind of disorder is that, remember what we've leanred during the Step Cell in Bio that we know how baby starts to form Gastula after the second stage called Blastocyst. 3 germ layers starts to form and each of them are known as ectoderm, mesoderm and, endoderm. From this process, the body generate a part called Neural Tube which later become brain and spinal chords. The disorder leads cephalic (head) end of the neural tube to fail closing in, which will lead into the absence of brain, skull and scalps. The remaining brain is often exposed because there isn't any skin covering the top of the baby's head. The word Anencephaly literally means "No brain" in Greek so it does make sense how the disorder is named. It is known that there aren't any special treatment to cure this disorder and it says that the baby will die in couple of hours or days(if the baby is borned) due to the absence of brain, etc. The disorder is pretty critical if you think about it because if a baby is missing part of its brain, it will cause huge defects on thinking and the remaining brain is also exposed. Baby with Anencephaly are usually deaf, blind, unconcious and unable to feel pain...:(
4) Baby with multiple Limbs : Polymelia
Polymelia is a birth defect that causes to have more limbs than what you're supposed to have as a human. The extra limbs are commonly deformed or shrunken. Lakshmi was a child born in India, she is accepted as Hindu Goddess in India having multiple limbs. Lakshmi is an actual name of goddess who have 4 arms and that's where she was named from. There are several causes that make polymelia. Sometimes an embryo starts as conjoined twins, but one twin degenerated completely except for one or more limbs, which end up attached to the other twin. Sometimes small extra legs between the normal legs are caused by the body axis forking.
November 7th ~ Nov 10th 2011 <--------These are the dates that I do not want to remember and erase all the memory if possible. These days were the most stressful, sweat dripping, tears dropping days of my life in highschool. I usually get stressed out a lot easier than others because no matter how hard I try, it feels like I've gained nothing from my effort. It's probably because english is my second language and I don't blame myself for not understanding better than other people who are fluent in understanding English. Well anyway, these days..YeaH. Monday was the worst day although I did not have any tests. It was because all the pressure was pushing me down on crappy Monday morning and all the tests that I had to write made me feel like puking and depressing. No big deal I guess, I had 4 unit tests for every classes and 1 midterm for Biology, and some projects that I was procrastinating on (totally my fault and I blame myself for everything). I'm pretty sure I wasn't the only one who were stressed, many people probably were stressed...Like me. Anyway, I would like to do the research on what stress is and the symptoms that you can get from it. What is stress? Most of people would think that stress can only cause negative effect on your body and also your mentality. But in some cases, stress helps you to perform under pressure and motivates you to do the best job. It is only bad if the habit of getting stress become consistent and you feel like you want to harm yourself because you're very stressed. Your body and your head is going to pay the price anyway, so don't get caught up on having too much stress. If you find yourself feeling frazzled or overwhelmed, you have to try to get your nerve system back down to normal. Stress is good when you have a small amount of it. Because you can focus on one task and do very good job on it. Think simple, think about what you can do first and what you can finish later on. I find myself rambling works all over the place, thinking 'how am I supposed to finish ALL this work?'. But think about how much work you can get it done by spending a little bit of time. I'm really focused on writing a Wikipost right now, that's because I feel very passionate for making Wikipost, not other stuffs. Stress is a normal response in our body so you don't nesessary have to feel guilty in yourself. When your body gets stressed, your nervous system responds by releasing a flood of stress hormones, including adrenaline (go on Jake's Wikipost if you want to find more about adrenaline) andcortisol. These 2 hormones prepares you for emergency action. You probably notice when you having stress, your heart beats faster, muscles tighten, blood pressure rises, breath quickens, and your senses become sharper. These physical changes increase your strength and stamina which will make you to focus and perform a well-done task
There are 3 types of stress that you commonly get. Foot on the gas - You've probably had feeling when you're angry at yourself and you're all heated up. You feel overly emotional and not able to sit still Foot on the break - You shut down, space out and show very little bit of emotion because you're depressed or feel withdrawn. Foot on both - This is the response that I typically get. You "freeze" under pressure and can't do anything. You feel like you are paralleled because you're extremely agitated.
I'm not going to go over too much examples of symptoms that you can get from having excessive stress. Because you've all been there and you probably know what it feels like to be stressed. I hate it and I find it difficult to control the level of stress. Some examples of cognitive symptoms are memory problem, not able to concentrate, poor judgement and thinking about negative things, etc. You may feel moodiness, agitated, not able to relax, feeling over whelmed, sense of isolation, depression, etc. I've had so much headache, diziness from having excessive stresses. Stress may cause you to eat more or less, sleep really long or really short, and usage of drugs.
Having too much stress is not good at all people. Like what Mrs.Holyoke Walsh told us, we don't have to get too much stress because it going to make things worse. DON'T GET STRESSED WHEN YOU'RE HAVING AN IMPORTANT TEST BECAUSE IT IS GOING TO AFFECT YOUR MEMORY..IN A BAD WAY. So just be calm and feel proud in yourself. I'm going to control my stress level so I don't have to feel guilty in myself.
I watched an interesting movie and a video clip over the weekend. I'm sure you guys all have heard the movie called "First 50 Dates" starring Adam Sandler and Drew Barrymore. The clip that I watched is called "The man with a 30 second memory". They were quite interesting videos and I wondered how it is possible to lose memory within a short period of time. I didn't research too much about the movie because it is a realistic fiction but it is not based on a true story. But the clip called "The man with a 30 second memory", it is a documentary based on a true person who in fact, is a great musician. Here is the link. You don't have to watch the whole thing because it is a documentary.
Clive Wearing was the guy who you just saw from the video. His memory only lasts between 7 seconds to 30 seconds. The cause of his disorder is known 'Herpes simplex encephalitis' which is a viral infection of a human that typically causes cold sore, but in Wearing's case, it affected his brain system. Herpes simplex encephalitis is pretty rare infection (1 out of 500,000 per year) but Wearing was affected and the virus affected his central nervous system. His brain was damaged and he's only able to remember things that happened from the past. His wife and playing piano are the only things that are stored in his memory.
As you all know, the disorder that Clive Wearing has is called Amnesia. Amnesia is simply word for loss of memory. It affects your brain system and you tend to lose memory that happened from the past, or you still have the memory from the past but you can't memorize things that happened recently. There are many types of Amnesia and I'm going to list some of them that are related to what Clive Wearing has. Anterograde Amnesia is one of the type that causes inability to store new information in your memory system. Clive Wearing have no more than 30 seconds of memory that was new to him. Wearing also have Retrograde Amnesia. The patient cannot remember things that happened before the injury and Clive Wearing can only remember his wife and his musical talent. He does not recognize most of his cousins as well as where he's living.
Unfortunately, there aren't medications for Amnesia treatment but there are several practices that can help to restore the past memory and hoping for the best result. The cause of Amnesia is very diversed and doctors need to find out details about the patient's medical history and find out how it was caused. (It could be organic causes or funtional causes. Organic causes are like car accident, infection, using drugs. Functional causes are psychological factor such as defence mechanism.) Some people may restore some of their memory from therapies but some will never restore their memory.
You know your life is good when you type something stupid and end up in a strange video. Well, I was on the weird side of Youtube again and I discovered this yucky/fascinating video.
How the heck the that happen?!?! I asked myself if these were freshly caught frogs from the wild (Not like caught 2 years ago). In fact, the chef said he just caught the frogs, cut its body off and peeled frog's skin. Since these are fresh frog legs, the cells inside are still intact. There are still plenty of ATP molecules stored in the cell and biochemical machinery still functions. If the legs are old, then they would run out of ATP or something shuts down to perform biochemical machinery.
Luigi Galvani (September 9, 1737 – December 4, 1798) was the first scientist who were able to demonstrate that electricity can activate a frog's leg:
The reason why frog legs are twitching is because in salt, there are sodium ions. Since sodium (and potassium) ions are used in cells to create voltage difference, salt can do the same thing as electricity. When frogs are alive, brain will give the signal for muscle to contract. In this case, it is the sodium ion in salt that tells muscle to contract.
Another cool clip just showing disection of a frog and experimenting with its nerve system.
Neurocutaneous Syndromes are disorder that leads to the growth of tumours in various parts of your body system. It is caused by an abnormal growth of cells in an embryo and it leads to the growth of tumours. There are different types of disorders that are categorized by Neurocutaneous Syndromes and one of them is called Neurofibromatosis. Neurofibromatosis is a rare disorder that can affect many part of your body, including the brain, spinal cord, nerves, skin and many other parts of our body. Neurofibromatosis can cause non-cancerous tumours on nerve tissues, producing skin and bone abnormalities. The disorder usually appears in the childhood, especially after hitting puberty.
Huang Chuncai and his father Huang Bao
Huang Chuncai is a man from China who still is suffering from Neurofibromatosis. As you can see, he had a massive tumour around the nerve tissues on his face. The weight of the tumour is more than 20 kilograms, which is carrying like a heavy dumbbell inside of his face. The doctor said that by removing the tumour on his face, he can be relived from carrying around a big tumour though it can unbalance the weight of his face and most importantly, he could bleed to death which was very risky. Regarding the fact that surgery could take his life, Huang wanted to get help because he's been tortured, abandoned from all the citizens and he spent his entire life staying at home because of how he looked. The first surgery took about 1 kilogram of tumour and the second surgery removed approximately 4.5kilograms of tumours. Huang said that he felt a lot better despite the fact that there are still leftover tumours to be removed.
First picture is before the surgery. The second picture is after performing 2 surgeries. You can recognize some of his facial area.
Throughout the book Hotzone, AIDS were mentioned at some point but it did not talk too much about it. I was curious to see what AIDS do to you and how they infect within the hosts. Since AIDS is like the biggest killing disease throughout the whole world and I wanted to research if there are medications or vaccines for AIDS. AIDS (an acronym for Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome)is caused by HIV (an acronym forHuman Immuno-deficiency Virus). As we all know AIDS is the most common sexually transmitted disease throughout the world. Today, there are about 33 MILLION cases of AIDS around the world. We believe that AIDS suddenly appeared about 25 years ago and quickly spread around the world. There was a rumour that AIDS could only infect people who are homosexual. Magic Johnson (One of the best NBA player during year 1980 ~ 1996) discovered that he was HIV positive even though he was not a homosexual. Johnson was a very masculin, man looking guy and people believed that there was no way that he was a homosexual. It is now been proven that HIV can infect anybody, does not matter the age or gender. Scientists believe that HIV originally came from chimpanzees living in Central Africa. Authorities claim that the virus stain was presence in Chimpanzees body for several thousand years. HIV is a RNA virus, which means that like we have learn in our classroom, RNA viruses can mutate which means that HIV can mutate into different strains that can affect other host cells. So basically, by the time when our body is immune, then HIV will change and affect you again. Researchers believe that HIV entered hunter's bodies through wounds while hunting chimpanzees. Many people doesn't know a lot about HIV and know what they really do to your body. HIV doesn't really make you sick but it weakens your immune systems which means that you are more likely to be exposed to illness and diseases. Unfortunately, there are no cure for HIV yet but I have seen an article that was about stem cell curing HIV and the doctor have actually done it. Timothy Ray Brown was a US citizen who lived in Berlin suffered from HIV and I believe that he was cured. Although curing HIV with stem cell was not fully ethic because a stem cell could become a human being. It was very expensive and the percentage of success was low.
References : Allers K et al. Evidence for the cure of HIV infection by CCR5Δ32/ Δ32 stem cell transplantation.Blood, advance online publication December 8, 2010. Hutter G et al. Transplantation of selected or transgenic blood stem cells – a future treatment for HIV/AIDS. J Int AIDS Soc 12: 10, 2009. Hutter G et al. Long-term control of HIV by CCR5 CCR5Δ32/ Δ32 stem-cell transplantation. N Engl J Med. 360: 692-8, 2009. Sam Hadley, H. (2009, December 6). Where did aids come from?. Retrieved from http://tafj.org/2009/12/06/where-did-aids-come-from/
This song makes me happy :) ^
Welcome to Justin's Wikispace!
Homework #1 : Sickle Cell Anemia
What is Sickle Cell Anemia disease?
Overview
Other Information
Symptoms
References
Homework #2 : Glycocalyx
What is it?
References
glycocalyx>
Homework #3 : Contagion and Viruses
What is this movie about?
How did I feel after watching this movie?
Realistic features from the Movie
Reference
Homework Post #4 - My belief on Stem Cell Research
Reference - Justin
Homework Post # 5 - The Hot Zone Part 1
The novel is a work of a fiction that contains 4 horrifying pathogens which are all filoviruses. Including Marburg, Ebola Sudan, Ebola Reston and Ebola Zaire.
Charles Monet is introduced. He decides to go on a vacation and he goes on a trip in Kenya with a girl. Several days later, Monet develops a virus from Kitum Cave that is later known as Marburg, which is a filovirus. After experiencing the illness, Monet leaves Kenya right away and take a flight to the hospital. He has a constant headache, red eyes, constant nose bleed that does not clog and he is vomiting a black stuff that was full of viruses. Monet eventually dies at the surgery while Dr.Musoke tries to save him. Monet is constantly losing his blood; bleeding from skin pores, and he throws up a black vomit all over Dr.Musoke's body. Dr.Musoke is infected because he has been exposed to Marburg virus(from the vomit). Fortunately, his illness was gone after 10 days. David Silverstein wants to find out what is the reason for him being dead. So he takes a sample from Dr.Musoke and finds out that Charles Monet died because of Marburg Virus.
Nancy Jaxx is introduced after 4 years later. She works in a military institution and she works in the Bio Level 4 room dealing with a virus called Ebola; a strain of Marburg, so it is another filovirus. She experiences a very close encounter dealing with Ebola Virus. She recently makes herself a deep cut on her palm and she witnesses a blood dripping through her space suit gloves while she is in the Bio Level 4 Room. Luckily, she is saved because she is wearing a second layer of rubber gloves which protects Ebola Virus from going into her opened cut. Later on, they find out the different strains of Ebola: Ebola Zaire and Ebola Sudan.
The part where it shook me was definitely how Charles Monet died. I couldn't go on reading because it was so graphic imagining stuffs in my head. It didn't really capture my interest, it was really horrifying that it took my interest. Like he was throwing stuffs that were full of black stuffs, blood, viruses and he started bleeding from his intestine, eek! The other one that captured my interest was the bravery of Nancy Jaxx. She was not allowed in the Bio 3 Level Room because the requirement was vaccinations (she had all of them but she felt very sick after getting the vaccines) so she was not allowed. Then, she moves on to the Bio 4 Level Room, which does not require any vaccination (because there aren't any!) and it was more dangerous. She had a big cut on her palm and it surprised me that she was not infected by the virus. What she did was more like being very passionate about what she loves to do, or she's really stupid for going in there, risking her life. (My opinion)
Homework Post # 6 - The Hot Zone Part 2
The second part of the Hot Zone is about the monkeys that are imported from Philippine. The monkeys are kept in Reston, Virginia and they were to be sold across the country. One of the worker in a monkey,house Dan Dalgard starts noticing that the monkeys are getting sick. He becomes a little bit suspicious since all the monkeys were to be checked to be healthy before entering the country. Later soon, illness starts to spread out throughout the monkeys and then to the other rooms in the monkey houses. The monkeys are infected and start to die. Dan Dalgard contacts USAMRIID after many more monkeys died. He is informed that the monkeys were killed because of Simian Fever (a disease that is very lethal for the monkeys but harmless to humans), but they are not 100% certain. An intern at USAMRIID believes that he has observed a filovirus, specifically a Marburg. The heads of the department want to confirm what really caused the death of the monkeys and Nancy Jaxx is assigned to dissect the dead monkey and find out what the virus is. After the dissection, Nancy finds a virus but she can't tell if it is Ebola Zaire or Marburg or perhaps a mutation of both viruses. People begin to panic because filoviruses such as these were never seen outside of Africa, yet it is seen just outside the border of Washington D.C. There are already 2 people who are sick and suspected to have Ebola inside of them. The C.D.C is called up and they're responsible to protect the citizens and USAMRIID is to look after the monkey houses. Jerry Jaax, Nancy's husband, is assigned head of the monkey house mission.
What surprised me from this part is that Jerry Jaxx is randomly introduced. I have a feeling that the author purposely put him in the book because something bad will happen. The other thing that surprised me is that there are already 2 cases of illness that is possibly shipped from the monkeys to humans. I believe in the middle of the book, Jerry's brother was killed yet there is no purpose either. I think the author put this part in the book because something significant will happen later on. This part of the book makes me think that what if I was in Washington D.C with an outbreak of a filovirus. I think I know how that would feel like because my house was on fire once and we were all panicking. That's what I think I'm going to be like if I was living in an infected area.
Homework Post # 6 - The Hot Zone Part 3
In part 3 of the Hot Zone, it brings back to the monkey house where the virus was found. They are in Reston and discussing what would be the best way to eliminate the virus that have infected the monkey. Jerry Jaxx sets up a team of members who are qualified to contact Ebola Virus that has been causing harms to the monkeys in the monkey houses. The members were informed that there will be dangers involved but they did not want the public to be informed. It ended up that, the only way to eliminate the virus was to kill all the monkeys that were in the monkey houses. The team had given T-61 shots to the monkeys to put them down and the bodies of the monkeys were bagged and dragged away. However, they soon found out that Ebola could only infect the monkeys but not humans. After all the incidents, the team gassed the whole area for disinfection. They used a special crystal and a sunbeam to change it into formaldehyde gas. The ending of the Part 3 basically says that not a single virus could survive with that much to the virus and the people are now completely safe.
It was terrifying the fact that all the stories that was told from this book was based on a true story. It was scary to see how the strain of Ebola Virus was quickly turned into Ebola Reston and killed all the monkeys that were in the monkey house. Virus is like a thing that you cannot predict when it is going to come and that's what scares me the most. I've became more insecure for myself after reading this book because there are viruses everywhere that can harm me. I work at a restaurant and I sometimes use the customer's washroom. I just don't feel like touching the doorknob to open the door and touch anything because so many people have touched the area. It may sound corny but I feel like I have become a lot insecure to the society and I honestly don't like being super clean but I feel like it is necessary. It surprising to see that the virus only killed the monkeys but not humans. I had a feeling that from this chapter, many people would have been died because of the virus. It is scary to think that just one mutation can start a worldwide pandemic within the human race and harm us.
Homework Post # 7 - The Hot Zone Part 4
In part 4 of the Hot Zone, the author of the book Richard Preston visits the Mount Elgon with couple of his friends, Jamy Buchanan and Frederic Grant, along with a professional hunter, Robin MacDonald, and his family. Richard takes many safety precautions and equipments such as a level 4 biological space suit because Charles Monet (from the chapter 1) was infected to the virus during his trip to Kitnum Cave. As he enters the cave with his flashlight on, he notices many diversities of things that potentially have the Ebola strain such fruit bats, insect bats, moths, flies, spiders, even rocks. The novels finishes with Richard visiting the abandon monkey house and notes that there are many organisms living in the house. He concludes that Ebola will be back eventually.
I thought it was interesting to see the author of the Hot Zone visiting the Kitnum Cave where the victim was killed due to the virus. It would be adventurous for sure but I would never be able to go to a place where it is full of harmful viruses. I also wonder what would happen if a person who does not know anything about the cave and visit there without any safety equipments. It was also interesting to see Richard visiting the monkey houses that has been leash for many years. I searched up the monkey house in Reston and I found some pictures that were taken between 1995 ~ 1998, which is the year when the monkey house was torn down.
http://www.pbase.com/eeegi/monkeyhouse&page=all
Personal Post #1 : How Calluses Form
Why research on calluses?
What are they? How are they formed?
Blisters Calluses Corns
References
Personal Post #2 : Bio Engineering
What is Bio Engineering?
Guys, really really thinkable video! Why would I bother posting a video if it doesn't interest you! Take some time to watch it and see how you feel about Bio-engineering!
Link to the video...
Reference
Personal Post #3 : Deep Sea Creatures
Deep Sea Creatures?
Deep Sea Creatures!
Giant Isopod - (also known as Bathynomus giganteus) A member of Isopod family. They are carvivores and they will eat just about anything that they can catch (like other deep sea creatures do) These animals are very prehistoric looking creatures...Giant Isopod can grow up to 16 inches and when they're threatened, they can roll into like a ball and protect themselves. Giant Isopods live at the depth of over 2000 feet.
References
Personal Post #4 - Hong Kong Flu in 1968
What is Hong Kong Flu?
Symptoms of Hong Kong Flu/H3N2
How to treat H3N2
References
Personal Post #5 - Top 5 UNUSUAL BABIES!
Warning - You will find some of the cases or images below disturbing in nature.
1) Two Faced Baby : Diprosopus
Lail, the two faced baby is born with 4 eyes, 2 nose, 2 lips and 1 pair of ears. Her body structure is almost the same as the normal babies, with 1 pair of arms and legs as well. It may seems a lot odd to people who have not had babies like her but her parents think that their baby was a gift from god...Pretty cool! The girl is born with Diprosopus or Craniofacial Duplication, which is and extreme rare condition disorder whereby part or all of the face is duplicated on the head, so one of the head is a head from her undeveloped twin's. The story is pretty unfortunate because her parents considered Lail that she was in a very good condition, just like the other babies. So the parents refused to evaluate daughter's health through X-ray or MRI(Magnetic Resonance Imaging)(1). Then, after 2 month from her birth in 2008, she passed away from heart attack. Since there are no evidences of evaluation from any of her body condition, nothing could be proven because she was buried right after her death. Scientists only knew that Lail had a disease called Diprosopus, a rare disease. She also suffered from Corneal Opacity from middle two eyes due to excessive facial muscle which prevents from closing the middle eyes. My assumtion is that Lail only has 1 brain because she closed and opened her 4 eyes at the same time and one of the head is an uncompleted part from her twin, the head is just proportionally stuck with her remaining head. But who knows, she may have had 2 brains that had different function, maybe 2 hearts, who knows...I'd blame everything on parents because they believed Lail was perfectly fine, but they did not know the truth...Fools!
2) One Eyed Baby : Cyclopia
The baby was born in Nigeria and she suffered from Cyclopia (also known as cyclocephaly or synophthalmia)It is a rare birth defect characterized by failure of embryonic forebrain to divide into two orbital cavities for the eyeballs resulting in one eye. She does not have a function of a nose because she doesn't have one...The cause of Cyclopia is from high toxic and doses from anticancer therapy which I assumed that mother have taken the seizure.
3) Two Headed Baby : Craniopagus parasiticus
Manar Maged was born in Banha, Egypt and she suffered from a disorder called Craniopagus Parasiticus; parasitic twin head with an undeveloped (or underdeveloped) body is attached to the head of a developed twin. Manar improved her conditions by having different seizures but there was no miracle that doctors could separate the underdeveloped twin from the developed twin. The other twin was named Islaam and believe it or not, she was alive. It seems like Islaam does not have organs, which is true.She was getting nutrition from Manar. She was breathing in and out with Manar's lungs and she was exchanging her blood with Manar's heart... Manar passed away from a brain infection caused by hydrocephalus at the age of six. There are only 10 documents of this cases worldwide and only 3 of them were documented to have survived from birth.
4) Frog like Baby : Anencephaly
As you can see from the picture above, the baby does not look quite normal...The name was not listed from the website that I was using, but it says that he was born in Charikot, Nepal and people are pretty well gathered up to witness this abnormal looking baby. The neck is missing due to excessive muscle tissues around the neck, arms are quite long compared to what other babies have, a big nose, mouth and lastly, the eyeballs looks as if it will pop out in any second. The baby suffers from a birth disorder called Anencephaly and what kind of disorder is that, remember what we've leanred during the Step Cell in Bio that we know how baby starts to form Gastula after the second stage called Blastocyst. 3 germ layers starts to form and each of them are known as ectoderm, mesoderm and, endoderm. From this process, the body generate a part called Neural Tube which later become brain and spinal chords. The disorder leads cephalic (head) end of the neural tube to fail closing in, which will lead into the absence of brain, skull and scalps. The remaining brain is often exposed because there isn't any skin covering the top of the baby's head. The word Anencephaly literally means "No brain" in Greek so it does make sense how the disorder is named. It is known that there aren't any special treatment to cure this disorder and it says that the baby will die in couple of hours or days(if the baby is borned) due to the absence of brain, etc. The disorder is pretty critical if you think about it because if a baby is missing part of its brain, it will cause huge defects on thinking and the remaining brain is also exposed. Baby with Anencephaly are usually deaf, blind, unconcious and unable to feel pain...:(
4) Baby with multiple Limbs : Polymelia
Polymelia is a birth defect that causes to have more limbs than what you're supposed to have as a human. The extra limbs are commonly deformed or shrunken. Lakshmi was a child born in India, she is accepted as Hindu Goddess in India having multiple limbs. Lakshmi is an actual name of goddess who have 4 arms and that's where she was named from. There are several causes that make polymelia. Sometimes an embryo starts as conjoined twins, but one twin degenerated completely except for one or more limbs, which end up attached to the other twin. Sometimes small extra legs between the normal legs are caused by the body axis forking.
References
Personal Post #6 - I hate stresses!
November 7th ~ Nov 10th 2011 <--------These are the dates that I do not want to remember and erase all the memory if possible. These days were the most stressful, sweat dripping, tears dropping days of my life in highschool. I usually get stressed out a lot easier than others because no matter how hard I try, it feels like I've gained nothing from my effort. It's probably because english is my second language and I don't blame myself for not understanding better than other people who are fluent in understanding English. Well anyway, these days..YeaH. Monday was the worst day although I did not have any tests. It was because all the pressure was pushing me down on crappy Monday morning and all the tests that I had to write made me feel like puking and depressing. No big deal I guess, I had 4 unit tests for every classes and 1 midterm for Biology, and some projects that I was procrastinating on (totally my fault and I blame myself for everything). I'm pretty sure I wasn't the only one who were stressed, many people probably were stressed...Like me. Anyway, I would like to do the research on what stress is and the symptoms that you can get from it.
What is stress? Most of people would think that stress can only cause negative effect on your body and also your mentality. But in some cases, stress helps you to perform under pressure and motivates you to do the best job. It is only bad if the habit of getting stress become consistent and you feel like you want to harm yourself because you're very stressed. Your body and your head is going to pay the price anyway, so don't get caught up on having too much stress. If you find yourself feeling frazzled or overwhelmed, you have to try to get your nerve system back down to normal. Stress is good when you have a small amount of it. Because you can focus on one task and do very good job on it. Think simple, think about what you can do first and what you can finish later on. I find myself rambling works all over the place, thinking 'how am I supposed to finish ALL this work?'. But think about how much work you can get it done by spending a little bit of time. I'm really focused on writing a Wikipost right now, that's because I feel very passionate for making Wikipost, not other stuffs. Stress is a normal response in our body so you don't nesessary have to feel guilty in yourself. When your body gets stressed, your nervous system responds by releasing a flood of stress hormones, including adrenaline (go on Jake's Wikipost if you want to find more about adrenaline) and cortisol. These 2 hormones prepares you for emergency action. You probably notice when you having stress, your heart beats faster, muscles tighten, blood pressure rises, breath quickens, and your senses become sharper. These physical changes increase your strength and stamina which will make you to focus and perform a well-done task
There are 3 types of stress that you commonly get.
Foot on the gas - You've probably had feeling when you're angry at yourself and you're all heated up. You feel overly emotional and not able to sit still
Foot on the break - You shut down, space out and show very little bit of emotion because you're depressed or feel withdrawn.
Foot on both - This is the response that I typically get. You "freeze" under pressure and can't do anything. You feel like you are paralleled because you're extremely agitated.
I'm not going to go over too much examples of symptoms that you can get from having excessive stress. Because you've all been there and you probably know what it feels like to be stressed. I hate it and I find it difficult to control the level of stress. Some examples of cognitive symptoms are memory problem, not able to concentrate, poor judgement and thinking about negative things, etc. You may feel moodiness, agitated, not able to relax, feeling over whelmed, sense of isolation, depression, etc. I've had so much headache, diziness from having excessive stresses. Stress may cause you to eat more or less, sleep really long or really short, and usage of drugs.
Having too much stress is not good at all people. Like what Mrs.Holyoke Walsh told us, we don't have to get too much stress because it going to make things worse. DON'T GET STRESSED WHEN YOU'RE HAVING AN IMPORTANT TEST BECAUSE IT IS GOING TO AFFECT YOUR MEMORY..IN A BAD WAY. So just be calm and feel proud in yourself. I'm going to control my stress level so I don't have to feel guilty in myself.
References
(n.d.). Retrieved from http://www.telegraph.co.uk/sport/football/teams/liverpool/6249462/Rafael-Benitez-raged-in-Liverpool-dressing-room-at-Fiorentina-admits-Fabio-Aurelio.html - image
(n.d.). Retrieved from http://kalaalog.com/2008/05/01/painting-raged-ravan-part-1/ - image
(n.d.). Retrieved from http://arstechnica.com/civis/viewtopic.php?f=22&t=39205&start=1440 - image
(n.d.). Retrieved from http://blogs.sfu.ca/departments/cstudies/pr/?p=236 - image
Smith, M. (2011, Oct 13). Understanding stress symptoms, signs, causes, and effects [Web log message]. Retrieved from http://helpguide.org/mental/stress_signs.htm - information
Personal Post # 7 - Amnesia
Reference
Personal Post # 8 - Dead frog legs twitching?!
You know your life is good when you type something stupid and end up in a strange video. Well, I was on the weird side of Youtube again and I discovered this yucky/fascinating video.
Another cool clip just showing disection of a frog and experimenting with its nerve system.
WARNING : It's pretty gross
References
Personal Post # 9 - Neurofibromatosis
Neurocutaneous Syndromes are disorder that leads to the growth of tumours in various parts of your body system. It is caused by an abnormal growth of cells in an embryo and it leads to the growth of tumours. There are different types of disorders that are categorized by Neurocutaneous Syndromes and one of them is called Neurofibromatosis.
Neurofibromatosis is a rare disorder that can affect many part of your body, including the brain, spinal cord, nerves, skin and many other parts of our body. Neurofibromatosis can cause non-cancerous tumours on nerve tissues, producing skin and bone abnormalities. The disorder usually appears in the childhood, especially after hitting puberty.
Huang Chuncai is a man from China who still is suffering from Neurofibromatosis. As you can see, he had a massive tumour around the nerve tissues on his face. The weight of the tumour is more than 20 kilograms, which is carrying like a heavy dumbbell inside of his face. The doctor said that by removing the tumour on his face, he can be relived from carrying around a big tumour though it can unbalance the weight of his face and most importantly, he could bleed to death which was very risky. Regarding the fact that surgery could take his life, Huang wanted to get help because he's been tortured, abandoned from all the citizens and he spent his entire life staying at home because of how he looked. The first surgery took about 1 kilogram of tumour and the second surgery removed approximately 4.5kilograms of tumours. Huang said that he felt a lot better despite the fact that there are still leftover tumours to be removed.
References
Personal Post # 10!!! (spin off) - What is AIDS?
Throughout the book Hotzone, AIDS were mentioned at some point but it did not talk too much about it. I was curious to see what AIDS do to you and how they infect within the hosts.
AIDS (an acronym for Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome)is caused by HIV (an acronym forHuman Immuno-deficiency Virus). As we all know AIDS is the most common sexually transmitted disease throughout the world. Today, there are about 33 MILLION cases of AIDS around the world. We believe that AIDS suddenly appeared about 25 years ago and quickly spread around the world. There was a rumour that AIDS could only infect people who are homosexual. Magic Johnson (One of the best NBA player during year 1980 ~ 1996) discovered that he was HIV positive even though he was not a homosexual. Johnson was a very masculin, man looking guy and people believed that there was no way that he was a homosexual. It is now been proven that HIV can infect anybody, does not matter the age or gender.
Scientists believe that HIV originally came from chimpanzees living in Central Africa. Authorities claim that the virus stain was presence in Chimpanzees body for several thousand years. HIV is a RNA virus, which means that like we have learn in our classroom, RNA viruses can mutate which means that HIV can mutate into different strains that can affect other host cells. So basically, by the time when our body is immune, then HIV will change and affect you again. Researchers believe that HIV entered hunter's bodies through wounds while hunting chimpanzees.
Many people doesn't know a lot about HIV and know what they really do to your body. HIV doesn't really make you sick but it weakens your immune systems which means that you are more likely to be exposed to illness and diseases.
Unfortunately, there are no cure for HIV yet but I have seen an article that was about stem cell curing HIV and the doctor have actually done it. Timothy Ray Brown was a US citizen who lived in Berlin suffered from HIV and I believe that he was cured. Although curing HIV with stem cell was not fully ethic because a stem cell could become a human being. It was very expensive and the percentage of success was low.
References :
Allers K et al. Evidence for the cure of HIV infection by CCR5Δ32/ Δ32 stem cell transplantation.Blood, advance online publication December 8, 2010.
Hutter G et al. Transplantation of selected or transgenic blood stem cells – a future treatment for HIV/AIDS. J Int AIDS Soc 12: 10, 2009.
Hutter G et al. Long-term control of HIV by CCR5 CCR5Δ32/ Δ32 stem-cell transplantation. N Engl J Med. 360: 692-8, 2009.
Sam Hadley, H. (2009, December 6). Where did aids come from?. Retrieved from http://tafj.org/2009/12/06/where-did-aids-come-from/
http://www.aidsandhiv.org/news/hiv-virus.html/attachment/hiv-virus - image
http://animals.nationalgeographic.com/animals/mammals/chimpanzee/ - image
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Random Post # 1 -
SHOCKING FACTS YOU DID NOT KNOW A MINUTE AGOBiology relation - N/A
Mind blowing - Yes